The Lesson, Promised

Apparently, I promised all of you a Lesson (history or otherwise) on Australia. One of your fellow Blog Readers who will go un-named (Barb in Vermont) called me out on it. I guess I was going to work it into the last post from Australia, which would have been Darwin had we gone there.

                                      But….. No Go Darwin, Big Wind, and Waves!

                   So, as promised, a short missive on the wonderful Country, Continent, and Island of Australia.

                   The previous sentence wraps up Australia quite nicely. It is the only country on our planet that is, in fact, all three of the things mentioned there. Those attributes, in part, also help explain how, and why, this unique spot has as many of the exceptional characteristics that make it so special.

                   Ever wonder why Australia has so many species of plants and animals that can only be found there? Before we tackle that one, let’s admit that there are many unique things that can only be found in any number of places around the world. Franklinite, a mineral that has phosphorescent qualities can only be found in our own backyard in the mines of Franklin and Ogdensburg, New Jersey. There are some species of Tree Frogs and Wild Orchids that can only be found in the Pine Barrens section of southern New Jersey. We could go on and on, naming and numbering plenty of endemic species of different critters and such around the world, but Australia kind of takes the cake here with regard to strange and totally unique animals that only live here and live nowhere else, including old, related guys somewhere else down the family tree.

To get to the roots of that tree, and reasons behind them all, we need to re-visit our old friend Mr. Plate Tectonics!

Actually, we’re going to visit his great-great-great grandpappy, back in the very early days of our planet when the seas were still boiling off and volcanoes spewed their volumes of ash and pulverized minerals into the still forming atmosphere.

Way, way, back in the day, say 1,000,000,000 to 600,000,000 years ago, there was a landmass named Rodina. But Rodina was fidgety, had itchy underwear, and couldn’t sit still. So, squirming around, Rodina split apart, and her various parts started drifting, eventually meeting new friends and colliding with them. These collisions gave way to the start of mountain ranges as the pieces pushed against each other. As these newer pieces moved around, a new super continent in the southern hemisphere came to be. Her name was Pannotia.

Pannotia had Restless Leg Syndrome and she couldn’t keep still either. She also suffered from schizophrenia, and she split up into three distinct parts, Laurentia, Baltica, and Siberia. These parts started drifting away and headed up north to start their own play group, eventually forming North America, Europe, and Northern Asia.

At this time, about 500,000,000 years ago, Pannotia became pregnant and some of those basic life-forms, namely with the single-cell itsy-bitsy critters that became the building blocks for later life forms. When Pannotia left to trek north, following her old lost friends, she left behind her twin brother with a really cool sounding name, Gondwana. Gondwana, who was a land baron, owned an incredible amount of property. His holdings included the areas that would eventually turn into South America, Africa, India, Arabia, Antarctica, and the subject of this whole essay, Australia. Little did they know, but the Bad Boy on the Planet, the guy that was pulling (literally) all the strings, was old Grandpappy Plate Tectonics, who after pushing and pulling all of these landmasses into each other, and then tearing them, and the still new (but further evolved) critter families apart, split them up with some parts drifting north to form the new kid on the block.

                              Her name was Pangea, who most of you have probably heard of. Now we’re into a more recent time period, say, 200,000,000 years ago, All those Itsy-Bitsie’s have grown up and become Biggies. Biggies with BIG teeth, like T-Rex and all of his friends and relations. We’re now into every kid’s fantasy land, the Age of the Dinosaurs! Mind you, all this time, Mr. Plate Tectonics, the hardest working guy on our still forming planet, was relentlessly doing his job, slowly and deliberately pulling these squished together landmasses apart. This started about 150,000,000 years ago and it took him about half that time, about 50,000,000 years to separate Pangea into two (still really big) not-quite supercontinents during the Triassic Period. These divisions, replete with the same types of rocks, fossils, and other traces of themselves is the way that present day scientists can re-imagine this giant jigsaw puzzle that once was one big happy (?) place.

Fast-forward another 55,000,000 years and we find ourselves in a rather familiar sounding time, that of the Jurassic Period! Big things were still happening on our planet. Asteroids slammed into us causing massive changes to our atmosphere and Poof!  Barney and most of his friends croaked.  Now we’re at 50,000,000 years ago and all of our present-day continents roughly resemble what they look like today. Antarctica and Australia finally parted ways, and Australia never got close enough to anyone else and remained a loner to this day.

The End.

Well, not really.

There is still evidence of our ever-evolving planet shoving her crust around. The Himalaya, the highest mountain range around is still growing by measurable amounts each year. Mount Everest grows higher by around a 1/16^th  to 1/8^th of an inch a year. This is because the subcontinent of India, who sits on her very own plate is pushing northward onto the Eurasian plate who is a lot bigger and stronger than the India plate, so this collision area has only two places to go, up or down.

It chose the loftier goal here and is growing upwards forming some really high mountains that we get to climb and challenge ourselves with.

So Don, what has all of this to do with Australia?

Actually, plenty!

          Remember how Australia and Antarctica finally split all those years ago and pulled away from Gondwana? Well, that left our heroine all by herself to evolve some really cool species of her own. Mind you, there are some obvious relationships with other animals around the world. They were connected way back in the day, but the Big Separation occurred long enough ago for Australia to take matters into her own hands and mold some really different life-forms, ones that everyone loves, and wants to see!

                             A full 93% (!) of Australia’s fauna (and lots of flora too) is endemic to that continent! The totals are 3000 vertebrae and 18,000 different plant species! This is because when Australia separated from Big Brother Gondwana those millions and millions of years ago, she still had the old (but constantly evolving) lifeforms on her. Left to their own designs, not being influenced, or molded by any others on the planet, they were left to their own devices and decided to become different, unique as it were, and provide us with lots of animals to go and visit on, say, World Cruises 😊, or other enlightening trips “Down Under”!

                             Here is a partial list of those “Specials” that can only be found here in Australia, or on the continent of Australia, or on the island of Australia!

                                      Kangaroos

                                      Dingoes

                                      Wallabies

                                      Wombats

                                      Kaolas

                                      Echidnas

Bandicoots, and a host of other lesser knowns.

                                      And leaving the best for last, the Egg Laying, Duck-Billed, Webbed Footed, Furry, little Mammal, the Platypus!

                   So Barb, that about wraps it up! I hope that you and your fellow readers have gotten something out of this lesson. Our next lesson and post will be on Komodo Island, which we are dropping anchor at as I write this!